


The Shining Shoreline

by beta_carinae



Category: LOVECRAFT H. P. - Works
Genre: Deep water, H.P. Lovecraft, Horror, The Shadow Over Innsmouth
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-13
Updated: 2016-07-14
Packaged: 2018-07-23 00:52:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,098
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7460262
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beta_carinae/pseuds/beta_carinae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Loosely inspired by the Shadow over Innsmouth - fishy terror from the deep!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys! This is my first time posting on here. Here's a horror based loosely on H.P. Lovecraft's 'Shadow over Innsmouth'. Playing around with some ideas. Comments and criticism warmly welcomed.
> 
> Stay spooky.

There had always been rumours about the village at the bottom of the lake. The folks who made a hobby of fishing there on the quiet afternoons and bank holidays often joked that it was still inhabited. I heard stories like this from my uncle, an accomplished fly-fisherman and local to the county for forty years. When my brother and I were young children we would stay up past our bedtimes and listen in to the conversations he had with our parents, trying hard to stay still on the creaking floorboards of the hall above the sitting room, so as not to alert the adults below. Often we went to bed with images of barnacle-encrusted churches and their fishy parishioners, of watery households, curtains swaying with the ebb and flow of the lake tides - bulbous eyes peering out. Of course, we knew it was all tall tales - uncle Addie had taken to drinking after his wife left a few years back, and was prone to unleashing imaginative tirades onto anyone who stuck around long enough to draw him into conversation. He was a lean old man, with fiery eyes and a shock of grey hair that grew thickly on his head. His beard was equally as impressive, which he took to stroking thoughtfully whenever in deep query. When he spoke it was with a booming voice, gnarled at the edges by years of inhaling salt-spray. He smelled always of the smoke that his wood-fired burner put out at night, and when he embraced you in a tight hug one felt infinitely warm and comforted.

When I grew old enough to become a strong swimmer, as was the tendency in our family, Addie and I would make the short trip down the country road from our town to the pier on the northern shore of the water, where he had a small motor boat moored - the reliable Avarice, named after his sister, my mother. After a quick engine check and general inventory, we would push out onto the lake. It sat low enough in the water to give one the disconcerting feeling that at any moment it might tip and sink into the greenish depths, but my uncle seemed to have such singular control over the vessel that I never once feared for our safety. It was as if some unseen force was commanding the boat from below the waves, assuring our course however viciously we whipped through the water. Above the roar of the motor I often heard him sing to himself, odd little poems with no discernable rhythm or tune. When I asked after where he learned them, he spun me a wild tale about his younger years - how he'd been a ship's hand on a brig over in America. The captain he'd served under had made the crew commit to memory several of these poems, and had them all singing as the vessel travelled through uncertain waters. He said something about the words having powerful meaning beyond the waking world. In truth, I put all this down to the Talisker whisky Uncle took swigs on from time to time, and the amount of water that must have clogged up his brain over the years; but occasionally I was taken aback by the certainty of these delirious ramblings. 

I enjoyed the times I spent on the lake with Addie, despite his strangeness. Being the shy sort I didn't make friends as freely as other children I knew. I took great comfort in the fact that I could always escape for an hour or two, onto the quiet shimmering plane of water. The lake itself was oval-ish in shape being about a mile in width and two miles from end to end, with a small island deposited in the middle connected to the greater land by a narrow lane. I would use my time out on the waters to spy on the odd village that sat on the top of the island, much as an old person sits hunched to keep out the cold on a long winters' night. It was by no means pretty, and was held in such loathing by the surrounding villages that no signposts could be seen leading one to it, nor did it appear on any survey or map that one could find of the area. The locals knew it by the name Mudtown, on account of the greenish muck that coated the lanes and shores surrounding the island. At sunrise and sunset you could see where it lapped at the water, shining terribly in the light. To anyone who cared to get close enough, it could be heard to bubble and ooze disconcertingly. Understandably, no-one who knew better went very far into Mudtown.

On particularly clear afternoons, Addie and I would take a route close to the island. This was where the unseen lake currents subsided a little, and small groups of fish could be seen to hover close to the surface, basking in the steady rays of the sun. Addie used these spots when he was feeling lazy - and hungry - for he could easily have tried for bigger catches in the deep water. I relished these types of journies because they took us close enough to Mudtown to see into the people's gardens and front rooms. Many of the houses closest to the shore had been abandoned a long time ago. Leaves and wood piles evidenced the most derelict of the houses. Their windows were shuttered, or where the shutters had fallen off, they were boarded up. Chimney piles lay half demolished, and sometimes one could still see rags strung from the old washing lines. It was like looking into some terrible future where the earth had finally given itself over to decay, only this was made more unsettling by the untouched surroundings. I fancied sometimes that I could see the shadowed faces of the inhabitants, staring out with glazed eyes. As well as my spyings on these odd domiciles, I kept track of the steadily increasing paths from Mudtown that seemed to lead down onto the shore and into the murky waters. I could never work out when or why they appeared, and after asking my mother was told it was the naughty children of Mudtown sliding down the hill for fun. This answer never satisfied me - I had never seen children in Mudtown. Indeed it seemed to be a place devoid of youth and innocence. 

It was on a day like this, I remember, I had my first encounter with an islander.


	2. Chapter 2

I even remember the date. July 17th, the day after my brother had turned fourteen. I was two years his elder sister, and by this time was so accomplished a diver that I often went out alone to the deeper parts of the lake while Addie floated by the banks of the island. The day was warm, almost suffocatingly so, with no breeze to cool the sun's scorch. Floating listlessly near a small clutch of reeds, I could see nothing but haze and the thousands of flies that hovered above the surface. Small fish brushed against my ankles and pooled in the shadows I cast on to the lake bed. When I was younger I had hated the soft touches of seaweed and scales on my legs, but had now grown accustomed to the sensations. I felt the lake's rhythm. Swimming through it was as if being part of a living organism. A short way off, the calm was suddenly disturbed by my uncle, who I could see thrashing his arms at me frantically, and shouting about something I was too far off to hear. With a few strokes I had crossed the distance and could now see that the reliable Avarice was inexplicably taking on water at an alarming rate. Addie was busy bailing out the water with the cup from his Thermos flask, which understandably amounted to a feeble effort against the incoming flood.  
"Ho there, lass! We've got an 'ole the size of a bloody cannonball!", he shouted, his sudden booming voice scaring away some ducks that had been milling about the lakeside.  
"What? What's done that?", I called out with some surprise. Before Addie could answer, I had ducked my head below the water, and true enough I could see a large-ish gash in the side of the boat. My first though was that the old man had put his boot through the plank, obviously. There was nothing to be done but drag the boat to the shore and get it out of the water before it capsized, soaking our belongings, and my now irate uncle.  
After instructing him to throw me a tow line, I took the rope and swam to shore, pulling myself and the boat through the shallows and onto the stinking mud-covered moss at the lakeside. By now Addie was soaked to the waist, having jumped out to walk the boat the last metre or so, but our belongings looked reasonably dry, save for a few lures and my packed lunch that were bobbing around.   
Addie was seething with anger. "This boat," he roared, "is made of the-"   
I cut him off before he could finish, as he'd remarked on this fact more times than I could count.  
"The hardest, finest Maple that money could buy, I know, Addie."   
"So what, then, has put that feckin' 'ole in it? Tell me that, then!"   
I didn't have an answer for that. While Addie fumed and shook his fists some more, I took a closer look at the chunk of wood that was missing, and was surprised to find that, save for a few stray splinters, the hole that had appeared as a gash under the water was in fact almost exactly oval in shape. On further inspection still, I managed to pry something from the surrounding boards with a pair of pliers from the repairs kit we kept on board. On seeing that I was digging into the wood, Addie rushed over and snatched the pliers from my hands, "What're you after, kid? Makin' it worse?", but his objections fell flat as soon as he saw what I'd plucked from the wood.   
It's sharp point twinkled in the midday sun. It was about an inch in length, with serrated edges, and it gleamed an off-white.   
"A tooth?", I said, looking to my uncle for confirmation.  
"A tooth, kid." Addie muttered this almost in disappointment. He sagged as if a great weight had been put on his shoulders.  
"I thought you said that the only fish here were pike and trout, Addie. That's not a pike's tooth."  
Addie didn't reply. He stared at the water, and everything was silent save for the slow lapping of the water, and the bubbling of the ooze that coated the shore. "We're going home. Now."  
I didn't argue. I'd never seen Addie this quiet. Even after my aunt had left him, he'd stayed cheerful despite his obvious pain. Addie signalled for me to gather our belongings and we started to drag the boat up the bank and onto the island proper. At this point I realised that we were stood at the edge of Mudtown. The houses that I had only ever gazed at from far away were now in clear view. It remained for us to make the half-mile trudge through the centre of the town to the main shoreline of the lake, from which we could walk back to the northern pier.  
Slowly, Addie and I pushed the Avarice through Mudtown, aided by the muck that coated every surface. The sun beat down on us, creating a heady stench of rotting vegetation and whatever else made up the ooze, filling the air and clinging to my skin. I was exhausted not long after, but spurred on by the wish to be out sight of the windows that lined the deserted street. They seemed impossibly black. It was the sort of feeling one gets when you turn off the lights and walk down the stairs to your room late at night - like something is behind you, watching. We were not twenty metres from the main shore when, with the quickest of movements, what appeared to be a child dashed from the doorway of a half-sunken house, and stopped in front of us. Addie and I recoiled in shock, letting go of the boat and staggering back a few feet.   
There was a sickening pause.   
The eyes were too big.  
The skin was too grey.  
The grin was too wide.   
It was missing a tooth. 


End file.
